Carton de-nicker



Nov. 30, 1965 L. E. KELLY CARTON DE-NICKER 3 Sheets-Sheet 1 Filed March 7, 1963 INVENTOR Lawrence E Ke/ly ATTORNEYS NOV. 30, 1965 KELLY 3,220,319

CARTON DE-NI CKER Filed March 7, 1965 5 Sheets-Sheet 2 Lawrence E. Ke//y BY 27 ig 4 ATTORNEYS Nov. 30, 1965 E. KELLY 3,220,319

CARTON DE-NI CKER Filed March '7, 1963 3 Sheets-Sheet 5 FIG. 4

FIG. 5

FIG. 3

- INVENTOR Lawrence E. Kel/y ip 7% 0/4 rmhf ATTORNEYS United States Patent 3,220,319 CARTON DE-NICKER Lawrence E. Kelly, 105 Lucia St., Newark, N.Y. Filed Mar. 7, 1963, Ser. No. 263,486 3 Claims. (Cl. 93-36) This invention relates to a machine for breaking or denicking paperboard carton blanks, and more particularly to a machine adapted to be secured to a folding and gluing machine whereby the carton blanks while in a folded and glued, flat-knocked down position, can be denicked prior to being erected.

The machine of the present invention comprises, essentially, a plurality of arms mounted on the frame of a folding and gluing machine, said arms having a group of rollers connected thereto by spring-biased pins having spring adjusting means on one end thereof and bifurcations on the opposite end, each roller being journalled to one end of an inclined lever and the opposite end of the inclined lever being connected to the bifurcated end of the spring-biased pins.

The machine also includes another group of rollers journalled to the frame of the folding and gluing machine below the first mentioned group, and spaced therefrom a predetermined distance.

By this construction and arrangement, a perforated or slit carton blank is fed between the two groups of rollers in such a manner that the two groups of rollers engage opposite sides of the slit blank whereby the vibration of the first group of rollers causes the portions of the carton blank defined by the slits to be displaced relative to the remainder of the blank.

Paperboard cartons used for packaging eggs, bottles, cans, and the like are fabricated from flexible paperboard stock and manufactured by cutting out, slitting and creasing a blank which is then folded and glued by well known machinery to complete a flat, knock-down carton. This carton is subsequently erected, either manually or by auto matic machinery, by squaring up the walls thereof and interengaging its integral cross partitions, to a set up cellular condition adapted to receive the eggs, bottles, or

cans.

The step of cutting out and slitting the paperboard blank is performed by a suitable cutting press; the portion of the blank to be wholly stripped therefrom being cut out and the portions of the blank to be flexed about integral hinges to the remainder of the blank being outlined therein by slits. The portions of the blank adjoining the slits are formed with fibers or nicks to maintain the slit portions in the same plane as the remainder of the blank to facilitate the delivery of the cut, slitted and creased blanks from the cutting press to the folding and gluing machine.

Heretofore the slitted portions of a carton blank have been broken away from the remainder of the carton blank prior to its being fed into the folding and gluing machine. This is not entirely satisfactory since the carton blank cannot be properly fed into the folding and gluing machine because the slitted portions of the blank are not in the same plane with the remainder of the blank; thus, it is necessary to bend the slitted portion back into the 3,220,319 Patented Nov. 30, 1965 ice plane of the remainder of the blank prior to being fed into the folding and gluing machine. Furthermore, after the carton blank emerges from the folding and gluing machine in a flat, knocked-down position, it is necessary to once again break away the slitted portions of the blank.

The breaking or denicking of the carton blanks has heretofore been done by breaker wheels, having mating dies, built into the cutting press or the folding and gluing machine. The use of this type of machine has been limited because the breaker wheels had to be synchronized with either the cutting press or folding and gluing machine, or to both. Furthermore, the use of mating dies limited the use of the breaker wheels to carton blanks having slits conformed to the same configuration as the mating dies.

Another known method of denicking a slitted carton blank is to subject a stack of the slit blanks to heavy pressure thereby bending the slitted portion of each blank away from the remainder of its respective blank. This is a slow, time consuming operation, requiring expensive equipment and the services of attendant personnel.

It is therefore an object of the invention to provide an improved machine for breaking or denicking perforated carton blanks.

Another object of the invention is to provide an improved machine adapted to be attached to a folding and gluing machine for breaking or denicking folded and glued, paperboard carton blanks.

Still another object of the invention is to provide an improved breaking or denicking machine adapted to be attached to a folding and gluing machine, the denicking machine including a plurality of idler rollers adaptedto engage opposite faces of a perforated carton blank.

Yet another object of the invention is to provide an improved breaking or denicking machine adapted to be attached to a folding and gluing machine, the denicking machine including a plurality of cylindrical rollers adapted to engage opposite faces of a perforated carton blank, whereby a paperboard carton blank having slit portions of any desired configuration can be broken or denicked.

A further object of the invention is to provide an improved, compact denicking machine which is relatively inexpensive, and simple to construct and attach to a folding and gluing machine without being synchronized thereto, while at the same time being capable of fast and efiicient production of a denicked paperboard carton blank.

With these and other objects in view, which may be incident to my improvements, the invention consists in the parts and combinations to be hereinafter set forth and claimed, with the understanding that the several necessary elements comprising my invention, may be varied in construction, proportions and arrangements, without departing from the spirit and scope of the appended claims.

In order to make my invention more clearly understood, I have shown in the accompanying drawings means for carrying the same into practical effect, without limiting the improvements in their useful application to the particular constructions which, for the purpose of explanation, have been made the subject of illustration.

In the drawings:

FIGURE 1 is a side, elevational view of the denicking machine attached to the frame of a folding and gluing machine;

FIG. 2 is a top plan view of the deni-cking machine shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a view, partly in section, of the denicking machine taken along line 33 of FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 is a view, partly in section, taken along line 4-4 of FIG. 2;

FIG. 5 is a view, partly in section, taken along line 55 of FIG. 2;

FIG. 6 is an enlarged view, partly in section, showing a carton blank being broken or denicked by the denicking machine rollers;

FIG. 7 is a view taken along line 77 of FIG. 2; and

FIG. 8 is a plan view of a pre-cut and slit paperboard carton blank, the nicks being accentuated for purposes'of clarity.

Referring to the drawings and more particularly to FIGS. 1, 2 and 3, the denicking machine of the present invention is adapted to be secured to well known folding and gluing machines of the straight line gluer type including upper frame members 1 and lower frame members 2, the upper frame members having pulleys 3 journalled therein for guiding conveyor belts 4. The lower frame members are also provided with pulleys 5 journalled therein to guide conveyor belts 6; the belts are driven by a suitable source of power, which, in some instances might be the same source of power which drives the folding and .gluing machine. By this construction and, arrangement a carton blank 7 can be conveyed through the. folding and gluing machine between the belts 4 and 6 in the direction of the arrows as shown in FIG. 1.

In order to attach the denicker to known type straight line gluers, a plate 8 having an idler, pulley 9 journalled thereon is secured to one of the lower frame members 2. One of the conveyor belts 6 is trained around the idler pulley 9 in orderthat a pair of rollers 10 journalled to a plate 11 may be secured to the lower frame member 2 of the gluer.

A cylindrical roller 12 is secured to one of the pulleys 5 coaxial therewith and downstream from the rollers 10, the roller 12 having a larger diameter than the pulley 5. The rollers 10 and 12 are positioned in alignment with respect to the upper surface of the belt 6 to form a group of rollers. which, together with the belt 6, support the carton blank 7 being fed through thegluer.

The denicker includes another group of rollers supported by a plurality of arms 13, 14 and 15 secured to one of the upper frame members 1 and extending transversely thereto. The arm 13 guides a pair of pins 16 slidably mounted in a pair of bushings 17 carried by the arm. The lower ends of pins 16 have a plate 18 secured thereto, the lower face of the plate carrying a pair of flanges 19, said flanges having a roller 20 rotatably mounted therebetween. A rod 21 is secured to the upper surface of plate 18 between the pins 16, said rod extending through a coil spring 22 biased between the lower surface of arm 13 and upper surface of plate 18. The upper end of the rod 21 is provided with a knurled nut 22 threadably secured thereto for adjusting the biasing force of the spring 22, to thereby compensate for cartons of different thicknesses.

A pair of threaded stem members 23 (FIG. 4) are adjustably secured to the arm 14 by suitable lock nuts 24, the lower end of each stem having a bifurcation 25 for pivotally supporting a lever 26 thereby forming a fulcrum as at 25'. One end of each lever 26 has a roller 27 rotatably mounted thereon and the opposite end of each lever is pivotally connected to the bifurcated end 28 (FIG. 5) of a stem 29 having nuts 29' threaded thereon. Each of the stems 29 extend upwardly through the arm 15 and are slidably received therein, the upward sliding movement of the stems being limited by the nuts 29. The

4!; upper end portions of the stems 29' extend through coil springs 30, each of the springs being biased between the upper surface of the arm 15 and a knurled nut 31 threadably secured to the upper end of each stern.

By this construction and arrangement it will be seen that the fulcrum points 25" of the levers 26 can be varied by adjusting the threaded stems 23 and the biasing force of the springs 30 urging the rollers 27 downwardly toward the rollers 10 can be varied by adjusting the nuts 31; thus, the denicker can be adjusted to accommodate carton blanks of different thicknesses.

Referring to FIG. 8, there is shown by way of example, a paperboard carton blank having cut-out portions 7a and slit portions 7b, the slit portions being held in the same plane as the remainder of the paperboard carton by paperboard fibers or nicks 7c, the nicks being enlarged for purposes of clarity.

As will be seen in FIG. 2, the roller 20 is positioned between the rollers 27 and downstream therefrom; thus, as the carton blank 7 is fed through the denicker machine one group of rollers, namely, 10 and 12 engage the bottom surface of the blank and the other group of rollers consisting of rollers 20 and 27 engage the upper surface of the blank. The rollers of each group are so positioned relative to the carton blank and to each other that when a blank is fed therebetween (FIG. 6) the rollers 20 and 27 break the nicks 7c and displace the slit portions 7b rel- .ative to the remainder of the blank.

In the operation of the denicker machine, a paperboard carton blank 7 having predetermined cut-out, slit and creased portions is fed from a cutting press to a gluing and folding machine, the nicks 7c maintaining the slit portions of the carton blank in the same plane as the remainder of the carton blank to facilitate feeding the blank into the folding and gluing machine.- With the denicker attached to the frame members of the folding and gluing machine, as described hereinabove, the carton blank 7 is fed into the denicker in such a manner that the rollers 10 and 12 engage the bottom surface of the blank and the rollers 20 and 27 engage the upper surface of the blank. The travel of the blank 7 between the conveyor belts 4 and 6 causes the spring biased rollers 20 and 27 to vibrate. This vibration together with the biasing force of the springs 22 and 30 urging the rollers 20 and 27 downwardly toward the carton blank displaces the slit portions 7b from the remainder of the blank, The carton blank then emerges from the denicker in a flat, knocked-down position ready to be erected, either manually or by automatic machinery.

There has been described and illustrated a device capable of performing all of the specially mentioned objects of this invention as well as others which. are apparent to those skilled in the art. Various uses of the present in vention may be made employing the described structure. Accordingly, it is apparent that variations as to operation, size and shape, and rearrangement of elements may be made without departing from the spirit of the invention Accordingly, limitation is sought only in accordance with the scope of the following claims.

I claim:

l. A device of the character described for attaching to a straight-line gluing and folding machine of the type including upper and lower side frame members, pulleys and conveyor belts for feeding a slit carton blank through the machine whereby the slit portions of the blank are displaced relative to the remainder of the carton blank, the improvement comprising a first group of idler rollers operatively connected to the lower side frame member of the gluing and folding machine and a second group of vibrating idler rollers operatively connected to the upper side frame member of the machine, the second group of idler rollers being positioned above and between the first group of idler rollers so as to engage opposite faces of a slit carton blank being fed through the machine and wherein the second group of idler rollers comprises,

a pair of rollers, each roller being rotatably connected to one end of a lever, the opposite end of each lever being pivotally connected to a pin slidably mounted in the upper frame member of the folding and gluing machine, a pair of stems secured to the upper frame member, each lever being pivotally connected to a respective stem to thereby form a fulcrum intermediate the ends of the lever, and a third roller positioned in the operative area of the pair of rollers, said third roller being rotatably connected to a pin slidably mounted in the upper frame member of the folding and gluing machine.

2. A device according to claim 1 wherein spring means are operatively connected to the pins for biasing the rollers toward a carton blank being fed through the machine.

3. A device according to claim 2 wherein means are operatively connected to the stems for adjusting the position of the fulcrum of each lever and means are operatively connected to the spring means for varying the biasing force of the springs, to thereby compensate for carton blanks of different thickness.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,836,393 12/1931 Reece 225-96.5 2,363,442 11/1944 Scott. 2,693,053 11/1954 Eakin 225-96.5 2,899,873 8/1959 LaBombard 9352 FRANK E. BAILEY, Primary Examiner. 

1. A DEVICE OF THE CHARACTER DESCRIBED FOR ATTACHING TO A STRAIGHT-LINE GLUING AND FOLDING MACHINE OF THE TYPE INCLUDING UPPER AND LOWER SIDE FRAME MEMBERS, PULLEYS AND CONVEYOR BELTS FOR FEEDING A SLIT CARTON BLANK THROUGH THE MACHINE WHEREBY THE SLIT PORTIONS OF THE BLANK ARE DISPLACED RELATIVE TO THE REMAINDER OF THE CARTON BLANK, THE IMPROVEMENT COMPRISING A FIRST GROUP OF IDLER ROLLERS OPERATIVELY CONNECTED TO THE LOWER SIDE FRAME MEMBER OF THE GLUING AND FOLDING MACHINE AND A SECOND MEMBER OF VIBRATING IDLER ROLLERS OPERATIVELY CONNECTED TO THE UPPER SIDE FRAME MEMBER OF THE MACHINE, THE SECOND GROUP OF IDLER ROLLERS BEING POSITIONED ABOVE AND BETWEEN THE FIRST GROUP OF IDLER ROLLERS BEING FED THROUGH THE MACHINE FACES OF A SLIT CARTON BLANK BEING FED THROUGH THE MACHINE AND WHEREIN THE SECOND GROUP OF IDLER ROLLERS COMPRISES, A PAIR OF ROLLERS, ECH ROLLER BEING ROTATABLY CONNECTED TO ONE END OF A LEVER, THE OPPOSITE END OF EACH LEVER BEING PIVOTALLY CONNECTED TO A PIN SLIDABLY MOUNTED IN THE UPPER FRAME MEMBER OF THE FOLDING AND GLUING MACHINE, A PAIR OF STEMS SECURED TO THE UPPER FRAME MEMBER, EACH LEVER BEING PIVOTALLY CONNECTED TO A RESPECTIVE STEM TO THEREBY FORM A FULCRUM INTERMEDIATE THE ENDS OF THE LEVER, AND A THIRD ROLLER POSITIONED IN THE OPERATIVE AREA OF THE PAIR OF ROLLERS, SAID THIRD ROLLER BEING ROTATABLY CONNECTED TO A PIN SLIDABLY MOUNTED IN THE UPPER FRAME MEMBER OF THE FOLDING AND GLUING MACHINE. 